456 AFRICAN GAME TRAILS 



the custom of the common or Uganda kob. They were 

 rather noisy; we heard them grunting continually, both 

 when they were grazing and when they saw us. 



At last, from an ant-hill, I saw dim outlines of two or 

 three animals moving past a little over a hundred yards 

 ahead. There was nothing to shoot at; but a moment 

 afterward I saw a pair of horns through the grass tops, in 

 such a position that it was evident the owner was looking 

 at me. I guessed that he had been moving in the direction 

 in which the others had gone, and I guessed at the position 

 of the shoulder, and fired. The horns disappeared. Then 

 I caught a glimpse, first of a doe, next of a buck, in full 

 flight, each occasionally appearing for an instant in a great 

 bound over the grass tops. I had no idea whether or not 

 I had hit my buck; so Cuninghame stayed on the ant- 

 heap to guide us, while Kongoni and I plunged into the 

 long grass, as high as our heads. Sure enough, there was 

 the buck, a youngish one, about four years old; my bullet 

 had gone true. While we were looking at him we sud- 

 denly caught a momentary glimpse of two more of the 

 herd rushing off to our right, and we heard another grunt- 

 ing and sneaking away, invisible, thirty yards or so to our 

 left. 



Half an hour afterward I shot another buck, at over 

 a hundred and fifty yards, after much the same kind of 

 experience. At this one I fired four times, hitting him with 

 three bullets; three of the shots were taken when I could 

 only see his horns and had to guess at the position of the 

 body. This was a very big buck, with horns over twenty- 

 nine inches long, but the saddle mark was yellow, with 

 many whitish hairs, showing that he was about to assume 



